Esteli - Week Three
Trip Start
Jun 16, 2008
1
13
23
Trip End
Sep 01, 2008
Esteli,
Nicaragua
Tuesday, August 5, 2008
Two of the girls in my class, Belkis and Martha, taught me the steps as roles were reversed however there is a story regarding Belkis that makes it hard for me to look her in the eye. Literally. She had joined us at Bar Titanic the previous Friday and had been showing me the photos on her camera. I noticed that in a couple of the photos her eye was half shut and would be classed as what one could refer to as a īcod-eyeī in English. Being the excellent teacher that I am, I explained what a īcod-eyeī was (for several minutes as she didnīt appear to understand) and when she looked a little confused I even demonstrated by closing half of one eye and pointing to it. It was only when one of the others referred to her as "the one with the lazy eye in your class " over the weekend that I realised she hadnīt just sported this īcod-eyeī in a couple of pictures but instead has a permanently lazy eye that I had somehow failed to notice!
After teaching, we headed to La Casita - a nice little cafe/restaurant which sells organic food - in the afternoon with a group of students. At La Casita, I had made arrangements to play football with a few of the lads from the university later that afternoon but as it was chucking it down I decided to be brave and go for a haircut instead. Thankfully there was a lady that spoke a little bit of English there so I could explain what I wanted doing a little more easily. Despite the fact that they shave most of the hair with some sort of razor-comb than actually cutting it, I was pleased with the final result.
On Tuesday night me, Ellie and Rachael arranged to meet up with Fidel (Student Union President) and Bismarck, one of the guys we met at the revolution celebrations in Managua, for a night out. We met them in the bar that Ellie and Rachael go in every night (Luner) and spent some time just chatting there. When me and Rachael went to ask if we could select some music for them to put on we ended up meeting the English owner, a lady from Kirby Muxloe in Leicestershire! Despite not getting to chose any music, Rachael decided to go on a charm offensive for the next ten minutes, telling the lady how she loved the bar/the fajitas/the lasagne/the salad/the drinks/her face and how she went in there every night and that it was the best place in Esteli. After she had finished brown-nosing we sat back down, finished our drinks and headed onto another bar that had historical paintings about Esteli on the walls. A few Flor De Caņas (the Nicaraguan rum) later, I headed home.
Wednesday morning and Rachael and Ellie had slept through their alarm, having only got in at 6am, meaning that they didnīt crawl into uni until the mid-morning break! Luckily for them, classes also finished early under Israelīs instruction so they didnīt have to suffer too much. Once the teaching was over we went for a farewell meal with Fidel and Bismarck who was heading back to Managua.
Our free Thursday afternoon was spent visiting a cigar factory with a guy named Wilmer (who used to be in my class but is now Oliīs assisstant) as he had arranged with his friend who works at the factory for us to have a tour. The tour was really interesting and we saw the different stages of cigar making. After the first factory Oli and Natasha left but Wilmer offered to take us to another cigar factory. Me, Ellie, Rachael and Wilmer walked there only for the guard to not let us in so we caught a taxi back into town and went shopping instead. As Esteli is cowboy town, me and Rachael went to the local cowboy hat shop and bought one each and having finished all of our shopping (I bought some new trainers as a replacement for the ones that got ruined in the waterfall in Miraflor), we strolled around town in our hats looking like true Esteli cowboys!
Our weekend began with a meal at Luner (again!) on Friday night with Sobeyda (Rachaelīs assisstant) and Israel. The following morning we all had a much-needed lie-in and I got up and did some washing Nicaraguan-style (in a stone basin, with a bar of soap) before meeting up with Ellie and Rachael to book our Tica bus to Mexico. In the evening we had a few drinks at my house and played cards with the family again. It was a nice start to the night apart from Rachaelīs drunken behaviour. Within the space of a couple of hours she had harassed the family cat, spilt drink over our table, dribbled drink over our table and to top it off as we left for a bar she decided to lock the bolt on the outside of the front door, locking my family in their own house! Fortunately she realised after we had walked ten yards down the street and I went back and heroically freed them.
We ended up in Axis, a club in Esteli and after a few drinks and a dance we got home at 3am, ready for the 5:50am bus to Tise on Sunday - or not. We planned to phone Israel to let him know that we wouldnīt be going to Tise so that he didnīt wait for us at the bus station but that didnīt happen. We felt extremely guilty that everyone missed the first bus waiting for us and that Israel drove to both bus stations in the city looking for us - Monday morning was spent apologising profusely to him!
